Tafadzwa's HALL OF FAME [Entry 002 Robert Granito's Comic fraud]

Being in the creative industry is a very demanding thing. People are expected to keep coming up with new ideas, new animations, new content. Robert Granita however decided to just go around claiming he worked on Garfield, Calvin and Hobbes, Batman, and even Teen titans for DC! Rob (pan intended) decided to sell "original" art to collectors who thought there were getting the real deal. Read more about this scandal at http://www.comicbookdaily.com/wp/daily_news/the-rob-granito-story/



 I agree with Comic book daily when they said and I quote "I think the bottom line for this guy is that if he had claimed he was a ghost artist copying other people’s art, he probably would have been okay, but instead he tried to claim it as his own". Rob has stole his last penny in the industry thanks to the 'co-smackdown' by Mark Waid and Ethan Van Sciver.

Visit the Comic book daily website to learn more about Robert Granito's fraud. This unfortunate story has to be entered into my Hall of (shame). I've never ever done anything for DC but you can see some of my work at www.totally2d.org. I hope Robert Granito's story shall fend off any other fraudsters looming in the arts industry.

The egg theory.

People, and I don't just mean me, but everyone has certain expectations when watching a movie, or walking into a place or country for the first time. As a designer one must NEVER forget this. To pump up one's adrenaline an artist must avoid the obvious, last week I was watching Hero Wanted. During the whole movie I didn't know what to expect, the guy was a hero WITHOUT super powers or anything! Not even a mask or cape. Poor guy was going against bullets, not in a invisible "rambo" way we've come to expect in movies. One could tell he was struggling through out. Enough about the movie...



Every project a photographer, designer, or animator works on is like an egg. Judging from the colour or size, you can gauge what will hatch out of any given egg. to some extent we have all become familiar with a chicken's egg size and shape. When you see an ostrich's larger egg you know you won't be seeing chickens sitting on it. That's the basic foundation of my egg theory.


Having established that any project/ brief one has is an egg, you should be bold and hatch out results that NO ONE else was expecting. Instead of a mundane ostrich hatch out a pterodactyl or something! When clients hand you an egg they have predictions on the course you shall take with their projects. The danger is if you do what they expected they end up feeling more intelligent than you. Which is not true, thinking alike makes both of you equally intelligent. But you can never get time to explain that, rather hatch the pterodactyl on them, and claim you dominance as a true designer/ photographer/ animator.

  

Back to my "Addicted to jeans" photo collection. I made a mistake in the photograph above, I love this pic don't get me wrong. I'm proud of the whole "Addicted to jeans" photo collection. However I failed to push the boundary by capturing the lighter flame. My model flicked the switch several times but the flame wouldn't stand. The first thing my Photography lecturer said was she LOVES the photo but I........... should have included THE FLAME! Oouch

The egg theory is not about just thinking ahead, but it's also about going that extra mile to hatch your next BIG IDEA or project. Next time you're holding an egg of any shape or size people should come to expect the unexpected from you. The "Hooked alive" animation project is one of the eggs I'm currently sitting on.

That's The egg theory!

(As usual feel free to check out my website: www.totally2d.org)

Tafadzwa's HALL OF FAME [Entry 001]

Hey! Sometime last year a friend and I went to an art gallery in Harare (Delta). On their lawn outside they have a life size wire sculptor of a bushman camouflaged as an ostrich. I tried my best to illustrate their ingenious hunting technique below when I got home.

I admire how creative and original mankind was back in the day. If I had a hall of fame some of this tribal wisdom would be brought to light. Thanks to great thinkers we now have televisions, & telephones (not cellphones- those cellphone thinkers just upgraded what some did from scratch). I'm an animator I have nothing NOTHING against technology but today's mankind should take a page from our ancestors' relentlessness in discovering and inventing day by day by day after day. None stop! Long live the bush men as the first entry in my personal Hall of fame.

Switch off your computer, go out and invent something today. Discover a solution to any of mankind's problems (without the aid of GOOGLE). When you switch on your machine again feel free to check out my website www.totally2d.org.

Hooked alive!

Greetings to you all , for the past 2 weeks or so I've been working tirelessly to assemble a team of voice actors for my next Animation project titled Hooked alive! Cisca will be one of the voice actors in the project. I shall look forward to sharing some of the design and animation ideas I have. The main gang in the project is as follows, from the left Petunia, Bait (the parrot), Martin, and LULU. To all who have read the script Lulu is by far the craziest character in the show, and I found the PERFECT

voice actor to play her part, watch out for that one.

LULU has what it takes to over throw Ambivalence from SALAD CHICK (click to watch).

 

I will be sharing some design tips and lessons that I'm learning in this promising venture. The first of which is variety.... Hooked alive boosts of having a wide variety of characters ranging from the cave man and his beloved wife below, and the pirate's daughter in the pic above. To capture a wide audience one MUST NEVER ignore variety.

 

Above is two of the preliminary character designs that shall be in the project. In my opinion the design process and script writing is going on well, and I expect to start voice recording today.   

Thanks to Angelique (who plays as Wife - above) Hooked alive is going to be partly done in Afrikaans, which is a first for me in my work as I've only ever worked in English and or Shona. Angie will also be the Narrator to all the madness that will be happening in Hooked alive. I hope the world is ready for my most promising project to date. I know I am.

 
Image: Tafadzwa ( designer/animator) and Cisca (designer/ voice actor- Pertunia)



Keep you eyes open for more updates on Hooked Alive by visit this blog or www.totally2d.org. more pictures and character designers will be coming.


Tafadzwa Tarumbwa

Addicted to Jeans (Photographs by Tafadzwa)

 Hello..
I really enjoyed my Photography Assignment! As a bugging designer/ animators I enjoy working with models which helps me to understand the human form. My model was AMAZING! Enjoy my ADDICTED TO JEANS photo collection. Its NOT animation but I recommend all designers to go out once in a while with a camera and study different subjects. This is the first of my many photo shoots to come. Enjoy...



 Addicted to Jeans was my first Photo shoot, I feel that my model was GREAT! As a designer/ budding animator we should all go out and explore the world's using as many mediums as you can find be it painting, photography you name it!





Addicted to Jeans! photographs by Tafadzwa Tarumbwa

I intentionally over exposed the above image in an attempt to capture the wonderful Durban sunshine that spreads from the city all the way to the wonderful beach. Cheers!

Photographs by Tafadzwa Tarumbwa. 

RUN cHiCkEn RuuuuuN...

The character below is a template that I have completed in an effort to practice what this blog is preeching.

Character designing (for Animation) is one of the subjects I want this blog to be centered on. I've been trying hard to follow the trends on how cartoon/ comic characters are being designed today. Growing up Sonic was one of my absolute favourite cartoon characters. Nowadays animal templates (like blue hedgehogs) are not as dominant as in the great 90s. Morden animators had revived animal leads as is the case with Finding Nemo, but human characters still dominate with Ben 10, and Dora the explorer coming to mind.

Some might argue that the aliens that Ben ten(s) into are representing the opressed creature population. Personally I think more animators should ignore the obvious and create stories that have out of this world beings. Talking chickens, handsome hyenas, and anything else mother nature gave us land, sea or airborne creatures, with all their shapes and sizes. I end this first blog by saying that as a designer/ animator the ball is now in your court. Grab it and run!!!


http://www.totally2d.org/
Tafadzwa Tarumbwa

The 'Athletic Chicken' above shall be one of my next Downloads for Toon Boom and Anime Studio users who visit http://www.totally2d.org/ Once its rigged it'll be available